Child Slave Labor in India
by Theresa Hanntz
November 2005
In a civilization as modern and as advanced as ours today, it is hard to believe that slavery still exists. Children all over the world, and especially in India are being exploited and forced to work long hours in horrible conditions against their own free will. Child slave labor is a very prevalent issue in poverty stricken societies and its horrors are a harsh reality for many children in our world.
In India alone, it is estimated that there are between 60 and 115 million working children, one of the highest numbers in the world. It is hard to find reliable statistics for the actual amount of children being forced to work, because the government does not want to become involved in what would be a very messy and heartbreaking investigation. The public is forced to rely on census reports made by people who are in fear of being discovered and who have vague definitions of child labor.
Children in India are working in all types of industries including cultivation and agricultural, livestock, forestry, fishing, plantation, mining and quarrying, manufacturing, servicing, construction, trade and commerce, transport, storage, communication, and many others. In the world today, India is the largest producer of diamonds and other gemstones, making this industry a very popular one, and also an industry in need of large amounts of cheap labor. The gemstone industry consists of several stages that entail importing, polishing, cutting, and then exporting diamonds and others precious gems. For more than a decade, India's major export has been cut diamonds, and in order to make this possible, it takes the long hard work of many children.
The workshops that employ children, receive uncut diamonds on a piecework basis from a distributor working on commission from a merchant. Some diamonds are processed in large factories, but most go to be cut in Surat, which is one of the most polluted cities in India. There are factories billowing with never-ending smoke and roads lined with sad attempts at construction and the small huts that house some of the diamond cutters. Diamond cutters are recruited at a very young age, usually for their keen eyesight and tiny nimble fingers and hands. The success of the diamond industry depends on these child workers because some of the diamonds that India deals with are so miniscule and hard to see. To cut the diamonds, workers use a ghantis, which is a horizontal rotating cutting wheel driven by a motorized belt. Four to five workers can sit around it and cut on their portion of the wheel. These dangerous machines have no safety features and are often the cause of terrible accidents among the workers. Diamond cutting is considered to be one of the top ten most dangerous industries. The cutting wheels are rubbed with kerosene oil and diamond dust to be more effective when is comes to health, but the dust that cut diamonds create is unbelievable, and also not good for a person's well being. There have been no attempts made to have a means for filtering the air. Workplace conditions are unfit for human life to grow and develop properly. The dust from the diamonds lines the walls and floors of cutting shops and turned them grey.
The sizes of the diamonds that children are working with are so tiny that they are almost nonexistent. It is extremely difficult for them to cut the diamonds on the grinding wheel because of their insignificant size. Much skill and agility is necessary to perform this job well. A single cut diamond has 17 facets, and a full cut diamond consists of 58 facets. Taking into consideration the size of the original diamond, this cutting seems like a miraculous feat. When comparing the size of the diamond from before it was cut until after it was cut, the end result was one tenth of the original value.
Some children are being forced to work in these conditions for unreasonable amounts of time. There are also other health and safety troubles that make this type of work very intense. Eyestrain, headaches, leg and shoulders pain, have an effect on the impressionable young underage workers who are being affected by these symptoms. The poorly lit workplace can become very congested. Workers also suffer from kidney dysfunction, lung disease, stomach problems, wheezing pains in their chests, joints, and eyesores. These are all preventable misfortunes if there was any type of concern in controlling industrial health hazards. Unhygienic conditions are overcrowded, and filled with malnutrition cases.
Workers are paid by the number of diamonds they cut per day, so in order to make enough money to survive, they must work very long hours. The average pay for polishing diamonds a couple of years ago was two rupees per day, which is less than eight US cents. A lucky family would make somewhere between fifteen to twenty dollars per week, and sometimes possibly over thirty dollars. This meager amount is not sufficient for any family to live off of, and is below the Indian income tax level. The concept of 'debt bondage' was another factor keeping workers enslaved to their employers. If a worker wished to return home for a visit, they would have to borrow money from their employer to pay for the trip. Due to the terms of these loans, it would always turn out to be impossible to pay back the debt on the salary that a diamond polisher makes, therefore enslaving the worker until the debt is paid off, which quite obviously will never happen.
There are around 10 Indian families who control India's entire diamond output. They are known as Indian diamond merchant princes and they are very powerful forces in jewelry markets all over the world. The low wages of child workers is a big factor that contributes to the very immense profit that only benefits these people controlling the child labor. In addition, the company that is supposed to be monitoring the Diamond trade is not an effective influence in condemning the exploitation of children that occurs. When asked about the living conditions of workers, Hindustan Diamonds, the company that is supposed to be monitoring trade, admitted that conditions were very poor, but that there was nothing they could do about it.
One of the main reasons that children become involved in slave labor is because they need to contribute a source of income to their poor families. It was found that a child's income accounted for between 34-37% of the total household income. It is essential for these families to force their kids to work or sell them to an employer for some time of profit.
The government in India is against unauthorized child labor. The country's constitution states that a child below the age of fourteen can't be employed to work in a factory, mine, or other hazardous places of employment. The health and strength of workers should be taken into consideration all times. There are several factors indicating that India has always had the goal of taking care of its children and ensuring their safety. In 1976, the Bonded System Act was passes in an effort to end forced labor. It attempted to attract support, workers were freed from debt. Again in 1986, a Child Labor Act was created to prohibit the employment of children who have not completed their 14th year in specified hazardous occupations and processes. This agreement only lasted briefly, because during diamond sale booms people would abandon relatives and school just for the chance to make look really good. There was a general lack of enforcement of this Act. In addition, the Factory Act, aimed to protect workplaces with fewer than nine workers. This doesn't always work because many times large work forces will be broken up and registered as mini-groups.
It is very evident that child slave labor is a huge problem in India. Many children are being exploited and taken advantage of. They are forced to live in unbearable conditions and work non stop for many long hours. This can be attributed to the widespread poverty, and the need for additional income in the family. It is a very disheartening practice that affects such a great deal of people in the world.
Sources Used:
http://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/Library/9175/inquiry1.htm
http://www.hrw.org/children/
http://www.anti-slaverysociety.addr.com/diamonds.htm
http://inquirer.gn.apc.org/childcut.html
Mariko Curran